Friday, July 24, 2015

[MLE] Local languages taught in Uttarakhand

Kumauni & Gharwali taught at schools in Uttarakhand

The government of Uttarakhand has decided to have the two major vernacular languages of the state, Kumauni and Gharwali, taught at all the primary schools.

The article "Grads in Kumaoni, Garhwali may be taken as primary, junior school teachers" in the Times of India presents it an an employment opportunity, but it seems much more than that. The article quotes Prof Dr.. S.S. Bisht saying: ""This is very good news for us, as teaching the languages to students from class I will help revive not only the dialects but also their associated cultures," Interestingly now the state is struggling to find enough qualified teachers to implement this: "It will be difficult to meet such a high demand in so short time. However, from this academic year, we have introduced options to study the language as an elective or as a single-subject course to increase the number of students,"

For me personally this is fun news as we lived in the Kumaun for many years and Dr Bisht was our neighbor. Congratulations, Dr Bisht for your hard work!